


Project Arachne

by on_the_wing



Category: Starfighter (Comic)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Colterons, Crack, Deception, Dubious Consent, Language Barrier, M/M, Recreational Drug Use, Shady Plots, this is my revenge on canon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-04
Updated: 2019-07-04
Packaged: 2020-04-12 14:47:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,548
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19134238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/on_the_wing/pseuds/on_the_wing
Summary: The Colterons signed a peace treaty with humanity just before Cain shipped out, but the shady plot is still a go...with a couple of very slight modifications. You'd barely notice any difference.





	1. Abel

The war was over, but everything wasn’t totally fucked. The Terons did not, as it turned out, lack the capacity for truce; it was just that no one had ever offered them the shit they wanted. Cow, rabbit, and horse shit, to be exact. They said it was good for growing mushrooms or something. Also they got an embassy on Earth and a huge plot of land on Mars that no one was using.  
  
Humanity still needed a space force, though. And Alexei still got to stay out of jail if he could make an Earth boy fall in love with his dick. Bering had promised.  
  
He figured it would be pretty easy. After all, _he_ was in love with his dick, so why wouldn’t someone else be once they got to know it?  
  
It wasn’t that easy.  
  
“I’m assigning you to a fighter and navigator team,” the smug beardy bastard intoned. “Your task names are Cain and Abel.”  
  
Alexei—Cain, now—numbly accepted the printout that Bering shoved into his hand, and gaped at his new navigator. This boy was nothing like the cute blond Earth twink in the picture Bering had shown him. He was seven feet tall and built like a tractor, with bulging black eyes and four clawed fingers on each massive ham hand. His entire head was shiny black like a flight suit and there were weird crab claw things and wiggly feelers where his mouth should be. He didn’t have any hair at all, much less blond hair. Unless it was all in his pubes. That would be even weirder.  
  
“Well? Move along, boys—the location of your quarters is on the handout.”  
  
“Sir,” Cain hissed, leaning in, “could I speak to you in private for a moment?”  
  
Bering sighed. “Very well. You can wait outside, Abel. He won’t be long.” Abel turned and calmly walked out the door.  
  
“Sir, has there been some…mistake?”  
  
“No. Why would you say that?”  
  
“That’s not the guy you said I would get!”  
  
“We had to change some of the details, but the basic plan is still the same. Get…friendly with him. Or her. Or it. Whatever it is. Learn from it. Report back to me.”  
  
“Why is a Teron in the navigator program, anyway? Isn’t it a security risk?”  
  
Bering leaned forward. “This wasn’t widely publicized, but part of the truce involves exchange programs in the military, scientific, agricultural, and artistic sectors. Lucky us, we got the military exchange student.” He gave Cain a dry but toothy smile.  
  
“So, what am I supposed to be learning?”  
  
“Anything! Everything! We know almost nothing about these things. This is an invaluable chance to gather intel, and we believe that you’ll learn more if you establish um, certain bonds with it.”  
  
“You mean I still have to fuck it?”  
  
“Yes, you still have to fuck it.”  
  
“But sir, I’m not some kind of perv! This is a bug we’re talking about! It doesn’t even have a cute ass!”  
  
“Son, our sources have confirmed that given an ounce or two of vodka, you’ll fuck absolutely anything. Even the shot glass.”  
  
Cain opened his mouth, but was unable to argue.  
  
“We can provide you with vodka. Now go forth, soldier, and fuck that bug!”  
  
\---  
  
Cain and the Abel-bug marched toward their new quarters in strained silence. Cain pasted a frozen smirk on his face, drawing on every bit of badass energy he could scrape up. He COULD make this bug his bitch. He WOULD. It was probably struck dumb by his aura of demented sexual menace, quaking in its stupid-looking boots.  
  
The printout slipped out of his hands and fluttered to the floor. Cain just kept walking. He wasn’t going to bend over for some stupid ~~bug~~ piece of paper.  
  
Suddenly the printout was in front of him again, clutched in a creepy claw hand! Cain snatched it back with a grunt and a slight jerk of the head that could have meant either “thank you” or “hands off my stuff, freak.”  
  
He strode onto the lift and whirled to face forward with military precision, ignoring the huge shadowy figure next to him. The huge shadowy figure ignored him back. It was the longest elevator ride he’d ever taken, even counting that time he and that guy from the twelfth floor got stuck for three hours and ended up fucking and drinking all the beer he’d gone out to get. And then trying to piss in empty beer cans but missing.  
  
After countless eons, the lift jolted and dinged. They stepped off and continued for two more agonizing minutes before reaching the room.  
  
This time, Cain let the bug go first so he could get a look at its ass. Despite his complaint to Bering, it actually wasn’t bad. It wasn’t small and delicate like an Earth boy’s, but he wouldn’t have been able to tell it apart from the others if it were in a lineup of fighter butts.  
  
What if there was a lineup of navigator butts? Like a gauntlet, but instead of being hit you got to smack them all as you went through? He filed that thought away in his spank bank, took a deep breath, and followed his navigator inside.  
  
Bug-Abel was standing in the middle of the room, mesmerized by the light panel between the two beds. What was it, a fucking moth?  
  
Cain closed the door behind him and cleared his throat. “You’re my bitch now,” he announced.  
  
The bug didn’t appear to have heard him. Seething, he dropped his bag, slunk up behind it, and grabbed its ass. “I said, you’re my bitch now.”  
  
It turned to face him—god it was big—and let out a series of clicks. “Apologies,” a tinny voice answered from somewhere in the bug’s chest region (conveniently located at human eye level). “I am unable to determine the correct translation for the words you spoke. My translation device is sparsely populated with verbiage and may contain errors. Also I may have incorrect data regarding greeting gestures. I was told that humans grasp the hand in greeting, not the buttocks. However, fear not, my translator and I both learn quickly.”  
  
Suddenly a giant bug hand was grabbing his ass. Cain shrieked and jerked away, swatting reflexively. This was _all wrong_. “You!” he shouted. “You do not touch my ass! You do as you’re told!”  
  
Abel just stood there. With those faceted eyes, he couldn’t even tell if it was looking at him or not. Cain hissed in frustration and stood up on his tiptoes, grabbing the back of its head. “Open your mouth,” he ordered. “If you have one.” That was a thought he hadn’t even considered. Fuck. Maybe they ate through their feet or something.  
  
“I do not require nourishment at this time.”  
  
“I didn’t ask you if you required shit! Open your mouth!”  
  
The crab claw things opened wider. It looked like there was some kind of lipless slit in there, although it was vertical instead of horizontal. Fuck it was nasty. Cain strained upward as far as he could reach and tugged as hard as he could on the back of the bug’s head, but he couldn’t quite reach its mouth.  
  
“Ugh!” he shouted finally. “You’re too tall!” He hated guys that were taller than him. Or stronger than him. After a moment he let go and looked around the room. The chair was too wobbly-looking and the desk and bureau were too tall, but the nearest bed was relatively low and looked sturdy. He climbed on top of it and beckoned Abel over. “Come here!”  
  
The bug hesitated, then walked up to him. “Closer! Okay. That’s better.” Now he was looking down at it, the way it should be. It was almost cute like this. Sort of. Cain felt for the chin that it didn’t seem to have, and ended up tilting its head up with a hand under one of those crab claw things.  
  
He leaned down and tilted his face at an unnatural angle, trying to get his lips and teeth on some part of its mouth. It was too smooth and hard; all he could do was gum at it like a teething baby. Maybe one of those mouth antenna things would be better? They didn’t seem to have the same armor. He nipped at one experimentally and shrieked when the crab claws scissored inward and sliced his cheeks open.  
  
“BLYAT!” Cain violently shoved the bug away, but the thing was like a mountain and all that happened was that he fell back onto the bed, feet over ass like a goddamn bimbo. “What the FUCK was that you fucking BITCH???!”  
  
Bug-Abel stood silently for a moment again, then began to click. “Are you injured? Blyat. My palps are very sensitive. I recommend that you avoid them for safety, bitch.”  
  
“WHAT DID YOU SAY?!” Cain roared, blood streaming down his face. “You are crazy. This is crazy. I’m not gonna fight for a crazy roach like you.” He scrambled off the bed, fists clenched, but remembered his mission and forced himself to relax, pulling in heaving breaths.  
  
It didn’t matter that he couldn’t scar the bug. It wasn’t like it could be mistaken for any other navigator, right? Once the fighters knew it was his, they’d leave it alone. They’d probably leave it alone anyway, for fuck’s sake. It was a giant fucking bug that could eat any three of them for breakfast.  
  
Bug-Abel didn’t seem to be interested in talking anymore, so Cain retrieved his duffel bag and began to unpack. He really, really needed a smoke.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promise you there is actual caibel later on--I'm not just doing a bait and switch. Although I thought about it... :D
> 
> I usually suck at first lines, but I'm pretty happy with this one. :)


	2. Romance

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I simplified a couple of things for convenience--this Abel is Cain's first navigator, not his third, and once they were paired up they were immediately assigned to the Sleipnir instead of bumming around on the main base first. This time the Sleipnir is just patrolling human-occupied space instead of invading Colteron territory.

Bering steepled his hands and smirked. “So, how goes Project Arachne?”  
  
_Why didn’t they just call it Project Bugfucker?_ Cain cleared his throat and tried to look confident. “Well sir, I uh, succeeded in establishing a locus of shared noctuary restitude in our domicile.”  
  
The commander grabbed his forehead as if in pain. “Just talk normally, son.”  
  
“Oh, okay sir. I got it to sleep with me.”  
  
“Sleep in the bed with you, or have sex with you?”  
  
“Sleep in the bed, sir. I uh, tried some moves on it, but it fell asleep right away. I think it was snoring. It was making these bubbly whirring sounds and the translator just translated them as static.”  
  
He left out the part about how he’d lain awake for hours, unable to tune out the snoring and obscurely terrified that the bug would wake up and want to fuck _him_. Or eat him in its sleep. When he had finally nodded off, he’d had an unsettling dream that he was back in prison, assigned to some new work program where they grew mushrooms in the basement. For some reason he had to go into the mushroom cellar naked to water the mushrooms, but his watering can was empty and he was too nervous and embarrassed to go fill it up where someone might see him.  
  
“I see. How are you getting along with it?”  
  
“Fine. It seems to like me. It keeps grabbing my ass.”  
  
“I heard it also grabbed Keeler’s. And Encke’s. And a few other people’s.”  
  
“Yeah, uh, it took a while to get it to understand that you only do that with your uh, partner. It’s stopped doing that now.”  
  
“Thank heaven for that.” He couldn’t tell if Bering was being sarcastic or not. “What have you done together so far?”  
  
“Well sir, we hung out in the bunk for a while when we got in, and then Abel had to go do navi shi—uh, stuff while I went to PT. Then we did flight sims. It had some trouble with our equipment at first but it picked it up really fast. Then it wanted to go explore the ship, so I went with it to keep an eye on it. I introduced it to some people.” At least that’s what Bug-Abel _thought_ was happening, and technically, it was. Cain had made a point of formally introducing each arm wrestling contender after they’d paid their entry fee. The bug was undefeated and, hopefully, still hadn’t figured out that it had been competing.  
  
It hadn’t taken Cain long to realize that the height, bulk, and monstrous appearance that absolutely _did not_ intimidate him could also work in his favor. Instead of having to spend his free time fighting half the ship to keep them away from his navi, all he had to do was parade the thing around and let everyone see that this huge fucking monster was his and would do anything he told it. Mostly. Sort of.

He should get it a collar with a leash. Then again, the bug would probably think it was some kind of friendship bracelet and expect him to wear one too.  
  
“Hmm. I suppose that’s a good start, although I expected more from someone with your reputation.”  
  
“I will definitely succeed, sir. Even lesbians are hot for me.”  
  
The commander coughed. “I notice your face is a little cut up. How did that happen?”  
  
“Just a misunderstanding, sir. It won’t happen again.”  
  
Bering eyed him. “Did you try to kiss the bug?”  
  
“Uh, yes sir.” His face felt hot.  
  
“And it didn’t like that, I take it.”  
  
“Unclear, sir. It may have liked it _too_ much. You know.”  
  
The commander let out a merciless chuckle. “I’m sure that was it.” He let Cain simmer for a long moment, then pulled a small plastic bag out of his desk drawer. “Maybe you should try some romance. Give it these—I hear the Colterons love them. Maybe if you give it presents, it’ll understand that you’re courting it.”  
  
Cain stared at the twisty little blue-grey mushrooms, feeling suddenly naked. “Courting it? I don’t have to…marry it, do I?”  
  
Bering laughed ominously. “Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.”

\--

  
Cain spread out the rug he’d borrowed from one of the maintenance guys and placed the vodka, cigarettes, and mushrooms in the center. He then lounged with one knee up in what he hoped was an enticing position.  
  
Abel showed up promptly at 1900, as he had instructed. So far, so good.  
  
“Ugh, what a freak,” it greeted him politely.  
  
“I hope you’re talking about my freakishly huge dick,” Cain said, hastily rearranging his alarmed expression into a rakish grin. “But glad to see you too, baby.”  
  
“I reached adulthood more than eleven of your years in the past,” the bug announced.  
  
Well, good thing. He’d hate to think what it would turn into if it hadn’t. “I know, it’s just, um, an endearment.”  
  
“I understand. I appreciate your devotion, bitch.”  
  
He winced. “You really shouldn’t call me that. It’s uh…” He could hardly tell it that it was an insult. “…only for special occasions. In private.”  
  
“I understand. I will only call you bitch on major Earth holidays or when celebrating a triumph.”  
  
“In private,” Cain reminded it.  
  
“Yes, only in the bedchamber. Or if we are alone in some convenient place.”  
  
“Uh, yeah. Sit down by me.” He patted the rug next to him.  
  
Bug-Abel folded itself down next to him with surprising grace. “What is the name of this ritual or event?”  
  
“This is a picnic.”  
  
“Explain picnic, please.”  
  
“It’s when you go outside to eat together. You bring food and maybe cigs or booze with you and sit on a blanket. We’re on a ship so we can’t go outside, so I brought us to a place that was kinda scenic.” He gestured to the stars floating outside the window of the east storage bay.  
  
“How often does this ritual occur? And for what purpose?”  
  
“No purpose, it’s just fun to do sometimes.”  
  
“I understand. It is for recreation.”  
  
“Uh, yeah. And…bonding.” He scooted closer and picked up the bag of mushrooms. “Have some of these.”  
  
Abel clicked rapidly. “Rejoicing! You obtained _bsrgsh_! And of a high quality harvest!”  
  
“Yeah well, I uh, heard you like them.”  
  
“I did not know that humans enjoyed _bsrgsh_.”  
  
“Oh, we don’t. We don’t grow them, that is. We’d probably like them if we did.” Cain picked one up and twirled it around by the stem. It released a cloud of weird-smelling dust. “We do eat mushrooms.”  
  
“Perhaps it would be prudent if you did not partake then, since the effects on your human physiology would be unknown.”  
  
“Pfft. I can take anything you can take.” Cain tossed three or four of the things into his mouth, popping them with his teeth and coughing as the spores puffed out. They left a strange tingly feeling in his throat and tasted like tobacco, chocolate, mold, and the color blue.  
  
“That was a considerably higher dose than I would take,” Abel’s voice floated out from its chest. So weird. Clickclickclick float. “I only take one at a time. Also, I do not eat it. I only inhale the spores.”  
  
“Guess I’m just…more of a man than you.” Cain laughed at himself. “I literally am. Because you’re a bug. Ahahahaha.” He rolled around on the rug.  
  
“Consternation. I wonder if eating this has affected you in deleterious ways.”  
  
“Nawwww, I’m fine. Never better.” He sat up and patted the bug’s arm, which felt oddly furry and crimson. No wait, it wasn’t. It felt orange. And salty. Delicious. He licked it but it didn’t taste any different with his tongue. He couldn’t quite taste it. He could only taste it with his mind. “Let’s—let’s play a game. That’s traditional.”  
  
Bug-Abel sat there for a moment or a day or a mile. “Agreed. What game?”  
  
Cain picked up the vodka. “One of us asks a question and then takes a drink. The other one has to answer. Then it switches.”  
  
“What is the objective?”  
  
“My turn! Are you a boy or a girl?” He tried to swig from the bottle, but it was still closed. He handed it to the bug, who could probably figure out how to open it.  
  
“I am not a human child. I am an adult male Colteron. Are you ill?” Bug-Abel lifted the bottle to its lack of lips, examined it, and handed it back.  
  
“I toldja, I’m fiiiiiiiiiiine. And the questions have to be sexy. Not boring.” Cain clung to its arm. His arm? That was one mystery solved, anyway. Next mystery: why was Abel’s arm so tasty? And why did what it tasted like keep changing? “See, like this. How big is your dick?” He tried to swig from the bottle again, discovered that the vodka was weirdly hard and opaque, remembered that the cap was still on, and this time managed to remove it. He handed the bottle back to Abel, and belatedly realized he’d forgotten to actually drink any.  
  
“That word is not in my lexicon.”  
  
“Dick. You know, _dick_. Diiiiick.”  
  
“Repeating the word three times has somehow not revealed its meaning.”  
  
“You poor thing. I guess I’ll have to show you.” Cain fumbled with his pants. It took him a moment to remember how to open them and pull out his dick. “See? Behold. The majesty.”  
  
Abel sat in silence for a moment. “Mine is bigger than that. Very much bigger.”     
  
“Hey! It’s cold in here, okay? And I’m not even hard.” Mostly. How big was its dick? And what did it look like?  
  
“I meant no insult. I only answered your question. I’m sure your dick is a superior specimen, among human dicks.”  
  
“Hmph.”  
  
“I believe it is my turn to ask a question. I have heard that among humans, the female inserts the egg directly into the male’s abdomen and it hatches inside his body, eating through his entrails and eventually bursting out through his skin. Do human males fear this, or do you welcome it?”  
  
Cain stared, then fell over laughing again.  
  
“Are you well?”  
  
“We gotta—gotta get you to med bay. See if they can give you a sex ed course. With diagrams.”  
  
“I would be grateful for that. I think.”  
  
“Remind me tomorrow, ahahaha. But—but no. That’s not what happens. I think someone on your side was watching horror movies.”  
  
“Horror movies?”  
  
“Movies about…scary shit. Shit that’s not real. Monsters and murderers and shit like that.”  
  
“I understand. Fictional media meant to terrify.”  
  
“My turn.” Cain swigged from the bottle, finally remembering to take the cap off first. It was nice and harsh but it was also lemon-yellow and fragile. “What’s your type?”  
  
“What is…type?”  
  
“What type of person do you wanna fuck? Uh, find attractive?”  
  
“Are you referring to reproductive or recreational sex?”  
  
“Recreational. Blyat. Who wants kids, ugh.”  
  
“I prefer partners who are creative and adventurous, but also feel the emotions of others. What is your…type?”  
  
“Blonds. Like this.” Cain traced a shape in the air which came out not really corresponding to any human (or even organic) body. It might actually be some kind of Mobius bullshit. “I kinda…I kinda like tall dark guys with muscles though. Sometimes. Specially if…if they have an eyepatch. But no one has an eyepatch. ‘Cept in movies. Too bad. ’S really hot.”  
  
“Hot means sexually attractive?”  
  
“Yeah. Uhhh…my turn! I dare you to…oh wait wrong game. Shit. Uh. What am I doing. Oh. Question. Sexy question. What…what…do you want to do that you’ve never done? Sexily I mean. Sexshly. Sex-you-uh-ly.” He tossed down an especially enthusiastic swig, and coughed.  
  
Abel considered. “I would someday like to be granted permission to have reproductive sex.”  
  
“Permish? Your old lady’s holding out on you? Whaddashewant, a Mercedes?”  
  
“My queen would only grant this permission if I served the hive with special distinction for a long time.”  
  
“Whoa. So. You can’t have kids unless the government says you can? That’s fucked up. You should just do it anyway. That’s what I would do.”  
  
“Even if I wished to defy the will of my queen, I am physically unable to reproduce without her help. All warriors and workers are born sterile, so she would need to make changes to my physiology. I would become a drone, fertile but unintelligent. Then I would either reproduce with her or with a female warrior or worker whom she made fertile. My female partner would return to her original state after the eggs were laid, but I would remain a drone for the rest of my life.”  
  
“Whoa. That’s fucked. That’s really really really really weird. And it smells like motor oil. Why would you want that?”  
  
“It is my turn to ask a question.” Abel bug reached out and pried the vodka bottle from Cain’s fist. Abelbug, A-bug, belbug, bug snug in a rug except he was sitting on the rug, not rolled up in it. Bug Abel. Gaybel. “Why do humans consider it indecent to go without clothing on most of their bodies? And why then is it decent to leave the head and arms and hands bare?”  
  
“I uh…I dunno. Those parts are less sexy I guess?”  
  
“Some parts are less attractive than others? How can that be?”  
  
“Well yeah, have you seen feet, I mean come on. Feet are weird, man.”  
  
“You are not speaking in a sensible manner. I believe you may have consumed too great a quantity of substances that affect your brain chemistry. I will bring you back to the bunk to rest.” Bug-Abel picked him up and tossed him over its—his—massive shoulder, then leaned a little forward, messing with stuff on the ground. Floor.  
  
“Put me DOWN.” Cain was almost too shocked to speak. “You _brute_.”  
  
“I will put you down when we reach the bunk,” Abel told him. Click click click. It climbed to its feet and the floor got a lot farther away. And fuzzier. And more purple.  
  
“At least carry me a different way,” he complained. “This way makes me sick. I’m gonna barf.”  
  
“Agreed. Barf sounds undesirable.”  
  
Suddenly the ceiling flashed over him and he was in Abel’s arms, carried princess-style. There was some reason this was bad too, but he couldn’t remember what it was, so Cain just wrapped his arms around his navi's shoulders—he didn’t have much of a neck—and snuggled close. “Did you bring the—the—stuff?” he murmured.  
  
“Yes, I have the picnic components wrapped in the rug right here under my arm.”  
  
“Your arms are really big,” he commented into Abel’s shoulder. The shoulder was really big too. Probably they both were. It sounded like anise cookies and smelled like the hum of a space heater. Shiny. He felt something stirring below and looked down. Huh. He’d totally forgotten to put his dick back in his pants. Eh, who cared. Not Abel. All parts were the same to him. Hahahahaha.  
  
They were wading through a sea of crates. Why were there crates in the hallway? Why were people pushing them around? Why were black and white flowers sprouting out of them, singing weird little songs about cigarettes? Why were the people so _loud_?  
  
One of them was barring their way. “Hey! Where are you taking him? Is he drunk?” It was a navi--a proper Earth boy navi--little and cute, with big angry dark eyes and a poof of pale blond hair that looked like it had puffed up as a whaddayacallit, a threat display. Adorable. Something about him looked vaguely familiar. And smelled like limes.  
  
“I can’t get drunk, baby, my liver’s made of steel,” Cain reassured him. “Just like my dick.”  
  
“Oh god.” The cutie averted his face. “You _are_ drunk. _Really_ drunk.”  
  
“He is overly affected,” Bug-Abel confirmed. “I am taking him back to his bunk to rest.”  
  
“How do I know that’s _really_ what you’re doing?” The blond’s eyes narrowed.  
  
“You may accompany us if you wish.”  
  
“Yeah, come put me to bed, sweetheart.” Cain put on his most seductive grin. “I need a goodnight kiss.”  
  
“Ugh. Can’t you at least put _that_ back in your—I guess that was a useless question. Could you—” he looked up at Bug-Abel. “No, that’s just wrong. Uh…” He made a hesitant motion toward Cain’s crotch, and Cain whistled appreciatively. “No, that’s wrong too. Uh, can you just put the bundle on top of it? Yeah. Like that.”  
  
“Scratchy,” Cain complained.  
  
“It’s your own fault for taking it out,” the navi said sternly. Except they were closer to the bow. Bowly. “And not putting it back in.”  
  
“I’ll put it back in _your_ back. If you back that thing up.” He cracked up at his own eloquence.  
  
“Are you sure we shouldn’t take him to the medical bay?” Abel asked. “I am not familiar with the details of human inebriation.”  
  
“No, he seems fine. Just make sure he sleeps on his side, so if he vomits he won’t choke on it.”  
  
“Alarming,” said the bug. “Perhaps I will separate our mattresses tonight.”  
  
“You usually sleep together?” The navi’s face wrinkled. “Are you uh, like….”  
  
“Cain has assured me that co-sleeping produces a stronger bond.”  
  
Cain was starting to nod off, head sagging against Abel’s massive chest, but he gave them a thumbs up. “Plenty of room for more though, princess…”  
  
A cute, exasperated, lime-flavored sigh floated past him, and Cain let go and drifted into sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Language note: Since the Colteron lingua franca (in this story) consists only of clicks, humans transliterate Colteron proper nouns as if they were Morse code, leading to some real tongue twisters. But hey, Russians are used to those. :D
> 
> The Mercedes thing is a shameless reference to the song Mercedes Benz by Miss Platnum, in which the narrator expresses her desire for the eponymous car and states that she’s willing to leave her stingy husband if he won’t buy her one. I won’t link to it because youtube links always get broken but you should go look it up, it’s awesome.


End file.
